[dwaite]

> Why can't it just go into this state without rebooting?

Because the state of the phone isn't clean - there is information in RAM, including executing programs that will be sad if the disk volume their open files are stored on goes away.

If your goal is to get to the same secure state the phone is in when it first starts, why not just soft reboot?

[TimeBearingDown]

this also clears out deeper OS rootkits if they could not achieve reboot persistence, which is not uncommon.